Editors ́ Picks

Since 150 years even war has rules

EDITOR:

Murat Suner

U.S. President Barack Obama apologized to Doctors Without Borders for the American air attack that killed at least 22 people at a medical clinic in Afghanistan, and said the U.S. would examine military procedures to look for better ways to prevent such incidents.

Regardless, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) wants to ensure respect of international humanitarian law after the most deadly airstrike in its history. Hence, MSF international president Joanne Liu has called for an impartial and independent probe by the International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission (IHFFC).

According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, people have always used violence to settle disputes. And all cultures have always had the idea that there have to be limits on that violence, if we are to prevent wars from descending into barbarity.

More than 150 years the Geneva Convention agreed on rules protecting non-participants, prisoners and the wounded. These rules are set out in international humanitarian law.

Yes, even wars have limits. And attacking civilians constitutes a war crime. All parties in all conflicts should preserve what it means to be human, by complying with international humanitarian law.

You can help by sharing this video “Rules of War in a Nutshell”, which explains the basics of international humanitarian law.

07.Oct

October 07th, 2015

Raped refugee begs to be let into Australia for abortion

EDITOR:

Vanessa Ellingham

A 23-year-old "vulnerable and traumatised" Somali woman who was raped on Nauru is pleading with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to allow her to come to Australia to have an abortion.

Australia's harsh immigration policy deems that any asylum seeker attempting to reach Australia will instead be resettled in one of a number of other island nations, including Nauru.

Abortions are not legal in Nauru which is why the woman, along with another suffering the same fate, has requested to be brought to Australia to terminate the pregnancy which is a result of the rape.

The woman, "Abyan" (not her real name) is one of two female Somali refugees who have requested help from Australia after being raped on the island. Last week the ABC's 7.30broadcast distressing footage of the other victim, a 26-year-old woman known as "Namja" (not her real name), calling police for help after her rape - she says it took police four hours to answer her plea.

The 23-year-old woman is 11 or more weeks pregnant as a result of her rape. Lawyers acting on her behalf wrote to Mr Turnbull and Immigration Minister Peter Dutton demanding a response on Tuesday.

"I don't know what's wrong with the system but their failure to respond comes across as cruel and heartless," said special counsel George Newhouse.

"Time is quickly running out, this is not a joke, a traumatised and vulnerable woman's health and safety is stake."

"The Prime Minister wants Australia to be known as a country that respects women, well, we can start with this poor soul," he said.

05.Oct

October 05th, 2015

Trans-Pacific Trade Agreement Reached

EDITOR:

Gurmeet Singh, Berlin

The Trans-Pacific Trade Partnership has been reached. After eight years of negotiaitons, a trade agreement between the US and 11 other Pacific Rim nations has been established. The agreement, which will tie together 40% of the world’s economy, still has months of negotiations ahead – the finer details will emerge in due course. However, it is already being described as a precedent-setting model; one that will begin to formally unite national economies into a globalised whole.

The precedent-setting element is being emphasised as other trade agreements, such as the Trans-Atlantic one; the Trans-Pacific agreement not only provides a model of trade for others, but also shows that agreements can be pushed through in the face of widespread protest, and slow, if not deadlocked-negotiation.

While locals from the affected nations wait for details to emerge, the opposition will unite a broad swathe of social groups, from environmentalists who claim the agreement will damage the environment, to conservatives who feel local producers will be short-changed by the deal in favour of foreign exports.

The agreement also has implications for investor-trade disputes, that seek to redress the complaint that corporations will be strengthened legally against states; here, corporations are supposed to be given a much weaker position than initially anticipated.

We can’t know the full extent of what this deal means just yet, but its passage has quietly made its way to completion without the world taking too much notice. That might be the most dangerous thing.

30.Sep

September 30th, 2015

Is a bridge to Europe the answer to the refugee crisis?

EDITOR:

Vanessa Ellingham

A provocative campaign is suggesting to build a bridge from Tunisia to Sicily to allow refugees to cross the Mediterranean safely, without the use of smugglers.

The Center for Political Beauty, which last year took busloads of EU citizens to storm the outer EU border at Hungary to mark the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall, has proposed the 230 billion EUR construction of a bridge across the sea where thousands of migrants die each year.

The plan has been backed by the Austrian government.

In a striking promotional video, the organisation explains that the proposed bridge would not be completed until 2030. Currently they are crowdfunding to build a set of 1000 rescue platforms across the sea which people can swim to if they require rescuing - this would be the interim solution.

As of this afternoon, the campaign has raised more than 15,000 EUR in just two days and there are plans to erect the first platform tomorrow, October 1. The public is even invited to attend the launch; a boat will depart from Licata harbour in Sicily at 6.30am Thursday.

However, the Center for Political Beauty is not the only organisation looking for ways to offer safe passage to the thousands of refugees attempting to reach Europe.

Doing so means they will face a fine of at least 3000 EUR per passenger who arrives on their airline without a visa. But they say it's a small price to pay for being able to deliver desperate people to safety.

"We will bear the entire cost of that infringement with pride," said Ryanair's marketing director Kenny Jacobs on Wednesday.

This decision could mark a major turning point in the refugee crisis if other airlines decide to follow suit.

Critics of EU immigration policy argue that one reason the EU faces a refugee 'crisis' is because many of the previously safer asylum routes to Europe have been blocked by EU law, forcing people to take the more dangerous option of hiring smugglers, resulting in more drownings.

We welcome any initiative that allows asylum seekers to reach Europe without placing their lives in danger. Hopefully one day the EU will listen up: safe passage must be made possible.

Amendment: it was discovered late this afternoon that the statement from Ryanair is a hoax. Ah well, we'll keep dreaming...

By now we have to consider climate change as a serious factor to cause wars on our planet. And, we need to understand that the devastating civil war in Syria may be one of its first cases, says Eric Holthaus from Slate, referring to a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science: "It provides the clearest evidence yet that human-induced global warming made that drought more likely. The study is the first to examine the drought-to-war narrative in quantitative detail in any country, ultimately linking it to climate change."

Holthaus explains how various factors influenced the course of Syria in a fatal way: "From 2006-2010, an unprecedented drought forced the country from a groundwater-intensive breadbasket of the region to a net food importer. Farmers abandoned their homes—school enrollment in some areas plummeted 80 percent—and flooded Syria’s cities, which were already struggling to sustain an influx of more than 1 million refugees from the conflict in neighboring Iraq. The Syrian government largely ignored these warning signs, helping sow discontent that ultimately spawned violent protests. A preventable drought-triggered humanitarian crisis sparked the 2011 civil war, and eventually, ISIS."

According to the study Syria had been conducting poor governance and unsustainable agricultural and environmental policies. The drought had a catalytic effect, and thus contributed to political unrest.

In an interview with Holthaus, David Titley, a meteorologist at Penn State University, considers Syria's case a "pretty convincing climate fingerprint. After decades of poor water policy, there was no resilience left in the system, and so the drought caused Syria to break catastrophically.”

Our dossier illustrates in that context why access to water is so crucial to enable peaceful human existence.

Christmas has come early for environmental campaigners. How appropriate then that it comes courtesy of the North Pole.

Shell, the Anglo-Dutch energy giant has ceased all operations in the American Arctic. An exploratory well, drilled 80 miles of Alaska's North-West coast provided disappointing returns - some gas and oil - but not much.

By pulling out of the region, and ceasing all operations for the foreseeable future, Shell is expected to lose up to $4.1 billion, having spent an estimated $7 billion preparing for operations.

The CEO, Ben van Beurden, was said to have been worried about the impact of drilling in the region, as it contradicted some of the company's messages regarding climate change, and plans for clean energy.

Environmentalists have welcomed the decision, with Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven saying:

“Big oil has sustained an unmitigated defeat. They had a budget of billions, we had a movement of millions. For three years we faced them down, and the people won."

Despite the valiant attempt to make this about people-power, and the relief Shell will feel not having to mix messages over clean energy and the arctic drill - we can be sure the only reason Shell haven't pursued drilling is because there was little oil and gas to be had.

That's somehow reassuring, and simultaneously not: we can stop big oil, but maybe only by running out of it.

Photograph: Daniella Beccaria/AP

25.Sep

September 25th, 2015

One small step for the UN, one giant leap for mankind

EDITOR:

Ama Lorenz

Today, 193 world leaders will commit to 17 Global Goals to achieve 3 extraordinary things in the next 15 years: end extreme poverty, fight inequality and injustice, fix climate change. This commitment is accompanied by a global campaign to raise awareness of the new agenda. And it is going to become a huge campaign. Already now are celebrities as Stevie Wonder, Beyoncé, Robert Pattinson and organizations as action/2015 or the Liverpool FC are on board to support the campaign.

In this year's July the UN published a report on the Millennium Development Goals in which some of the successful activities are highlighted. The number of people now living in extreme poverty has declined by more than half, falling from 1.9 billion in 1990 to 836 million in 2015; or over 6.2 million malaria deaths have been averted between 2000 and 2015 (see also fairplanet's dossier on malaria). But still, there is so much to change.

Yesterday, before the SDGs are formally adopted in New York, more than 2,000 organizations hold events in over 100 countries calling for leaders to commit fully to the new development agenda.

It is a very ambitious goal to half the global poverty within the next 15 years. But it is also more than necessary. Many conflicts, the recent refugee situation or global climate changes are connected to the conditions under which people around the globe suffer from poverty. What often started as a vision turned out to be a social change. So, it is the first step the governments do today. Let's hope it becomes an active commitment to the mankind.

The world's second-largest car manufacturer has admitted fitting more than 11 million cars with a device that cheats carbon emissions testing.

The number of vehicles affected is more than the number of vehicles Volkswagon makes in one year.

Any doubt that financial investors don't care about a manufacturer's climate responsibility was quickly dashed as VW's share price dropped by a third on Monday, or around 25 billion EUR.

Good news for supporters of fossil fuel divestment campaigns, bad news for VW.

The cars were made to cheat emissions testing by being fitted by a device that recognises when it is being tested and quickly cuts emissions to a level much lower than normal - one it could never sustain under regular driving conditions.

So far VW's Chief Executive has refused to quit, and been forced to face the public amid news reports that he will be succeeded by a new boss this Friday.

21.Sep

September 21st, 2015

Same old, same old. But different.

EDITOR:

Gurmeet Singh, Berlin

Déjà vu is the feeling of having experienced something you've never experienced before. Déjà entendu, however, is feeling you've experienced something before - but you're not exactly sure when or where. Well, the latter seems closer to Greek and European experience this morning: Alexis Tspiras and Syriza will form the new government, with just 5 seats short of a majority.

The purpose of the election was to see-off the party-revolt that loomed after Tspiras accepted the terms offered to him by the Troika which included more austerity for the sake of a bailout package.

Tspiras broke election promises in his first go in office, being sworn in as Prime Minister in January this year, when he accepted the terms. Now he's renewed his mandate to govern, but has lost credibility among many left-wing groups and thinkers worldwide.

Well, we might not like it - but more austerity is what the Greek people have endorsed the agenda. It feels a lot like the start of the year, but it's different. Then, Syriza offered the Greek people and the rest of Europe a way out of austerity, and a way to challenge the increasingly harsh, anti-democratic practices of the EU. Now, they work for those practices.

Let's hope the new government can serve the people as well as they hoped in January.

18.Sep

September 18th, 2015

Is that the end of the „African spring“?

EDITOR:

Ama Lorenz

On Wednesday (16 September 2015), the Presidential Guard (Régiment de Sécurité Présidentielle, RSP) - a holdover from the dictatorship of Blaise Compaoré - stormed a cabinet meeting of the Transitional Government of Burkina Faso in Ouagadougou, the capital.

Burkina Faso’s transitional government has backed the democratic transition of the country since the fall of Compaoré end of October 2014 and was preparing the first democratic elections, which should take place on 11 October 2015.

A largely peaceful mass movement and protests, especially by the young population of Burkina Faso, had forced Blaise Compaoré in autumn 2014 to resign. Prior and after 27 years in power, he had tried to secure him a second term through a constitutional amendment, but was failed due to the protests of the population and eventually fled to neighbouring Ivory Coast.

Many observers interpreted that the Burkinabe did not accept the constitutional amendment and protested successfully in a non-violent way as a signal that the country is on the road to democracy. Many spoke in reference to the Arab Spring by an "African Spring".

Although in exile, ex-president Blaise Compaoré rules the armed to the teeth and extremely well trained, 1,300 men strong special unit and is responsible for much sorrow in the long-suffering Burkina Faso. Transitional President Kafando, Prime Minister Yacouba Isaac Zida and two ministers have fallen now into the hands of Compaoré's elite unit.

The Burkinabe did respond to the kidnapping of the government with massive demonstrations that were brutally crushed by the RSP. All radio and television stations were under military occupation and stopped the transmissions; journalists were systematically persecuted and mistreated. There were wounded and dead.

The claims of RSP were initially unclear. The worst fears were confirmed on Thursday morning: On Television was announced that the government and the National Council of Transition (Conseil National de la Transition, CNT) were deposed. The by then non-existent Conseil National de la Démocratie (CND) will now rule the country. Shortly thereafter, the internationally known felon and murderer Gilbert Diendéré appointed himself as the President of the CND and thus head of state of Burkina Faso. Gilbert Diendéré is considered the right hand of Blaise Compaoré and among other crimes, the murder of one of the greatest political figures in Africa, the former president of Burkina Faso, Thomas Sankara. At the same, the President of the CNT, Cheriff Sy, applies constitutionally as the legitimate interim president in the absence of the President Kafando.

General Gilbert Diendéré wants to postpone the elections. “Today it seems to me that the October 11 date is too soon to hold the election”, the commander of the presidential guard said in an interview with The Associated Press.

The actions of the military were strongly condemned on international level. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said in New York, the action was outrageous and a violation against the Constitution. The foreign policy chief of the European Union, Federica Mogherini said the developments endangered the transition to democracy in Burkina Faso. French President Francois Hollande condemned the coup and called for the release of detainees and the restoration of the transitional government.

Observers say these testimonies won’t be enough. Actions are needed as the latest political unrests sparked violence in the streets against peaceful demonstrating Burkinabes and the first signs of an “African Spring” seem to become obliterate by an undemocratic and violent coup government.